An Eclectic Journal of Opinion, History, Poetry and General Bloviating

Monday, January 26, 2015

Rocky’s Short, Final Fall

Nelson Rockefeller shortly before his death.

I’m sorry.I just can’t help myself.

On January 26, 1979 Nelson Rockefeller, former Vice President of the United States, Governor of New York, Assistant Secretary of State, one of
the richest men in America, patron of the arts, philanthropist, and Baptist collapsed with a massive heart attack at the age of 70.

Unfortunately for him, he collapsed
on 27 year old Megan Marshak, an aide to the political powerhouse. He was naked.So was she.She struggled to get
the large, heavy man off her.In doing
so she may have pushed him off her bed and onto the floor.Anyway, that’s where he was found by a
responding ambulance crew.

In the town house at 13 West 54th Streetin
New York City where Rockefeller
theoretically kept a secondary office, but was really Marshak’s residence, the
young woman went into a panic.The affair
between the two had been a very well kept secret.Rockefeller was very publicly married to his
second wife, the former Margaretta
“Happy” Murphy, herself a one time aide when Rockefeller was governor of the Empire
State.Not knowing what else to do,
Marshak phoned her close friend news reporterPonchitta
Pierce.

When Pierce arrived, she found Rockefeller unconscious but still breathing.The two finally decided to call an ambulance
after determining that they could not get the man dressed.The ambulance arrived after a delay of around
an hour.Rockefeller died in the vehicle
on the way to the hospital.Opinion
remains divided on whether, given the state of medicine at the time, he could
have been saved if he received immediate attention.

Meanwhile the family scrambled into a protective mode.The first press announcements said that Rockefeller was found collapsed at
his desk at his main office in Rockefeller
Center by a security guard.That
tale unraveled quickly.The family
acknowledged that he was with Marshak, but claimed they were working together
in the second office.The press pretty
quickly surmised that this was a ruse and began hinting, as broadly as possible
in those more discrete days, that there might have been hanky-panky going on.

The widow Happy hastily arranged for her husband’s remains to be cremated.But an official autopsy confirmed that Rockefeller died after a heart attack during
or shortly after coitus.

Ms. Marshak in professional mode. Only 2 photos of her exist.

The family and close friends gathered for a funeral on January 29 and the ashes were interred at the private
Rockefeller family cemetery in Sleepy
Hollow, New York.On February 2 a
public memorial was held at the famous Riverside
Church attended by more than 2,200 people including President Jimmy Carter, former President Gerald R. Ford, more than 100 current or former members of Congress, as well as official
representatives from more than 70 nations.

Among those in attendance was Senator
Barry Goldwater, whose insurgent campaign against Rockefeller and the hated
Eastern Liberal Republican Establishment
in 1964 denied Rocky his second shot at the Republican Party nomination for President—the one that was probably
doomed by his hasty divorce from his first wife and equally hasty marriage to
Happy, who had just dumped her own long-time spouse.

Nelson and Happy in better times.

Conservatives
could hardly contain their glee at Rockefeller demise and the embarrassing
circumstances.They considered it the
death knell of liberal Republicanism.And it pretty much was.It took a while, but the species Rockefeller
represented is now as extinct as the dodo.Even today a Google search of Rockefeller’s death will turn up dozens of right wing web sites still gloating and
many consigning their old foe to eternal damnation.These folks never give up a grudge.

As for the hapless young Megan
Marshak, she held up for weeks in the town house, never leaving, answering the
phone, or granting any interviews.When
Rockefeller’s will was read, Marshak was left the deed to the now infamous townhouse.

Then she essentially vanished.Only two know photographs, both taken before the death, are known to exist.Despite enormous press interest she was able
to disappear.In 1992 it was reported
that she was living in New York and working quietly as a TV news writer and
producer.In 2008 that pillar of
journalism Parade Magazine reported that she had married and was living
quietly in southern California.